Project Description LEPRA Society - Health in Action
Duration: September 2005 - September 2010
Partners: National AIDS Control Organization (NACO), Andhra Pradesh State AIDS Control Society (APSACS), Catholic Health Association of India (CHAI), Indian Clinical Epidemiology Network (IndiaCLEN)
Geographic Focus: Andhra Pradesh and National-level (through IndiaCLEN)
Project Profile: LEPRA Society has 20 years' experience fighting communicable diseases and promoting community health. LEPRA is committed to fighting disease, disability and discrimination and aims to heal persons affected by leprosy, tuberculosis, malaria, lymphatic filariasis, HIV/AIDS and disabilities through appropriate treatment, care and support. LEPRA Society currently works in 54 districts in Andhra Pradesh, Orissa, Bihar and Madhya Pradesh, covering a population of 12 million people. The head quarters are located in Secunderabad, Andhra Pradesh.
Key Ongoing Activities:
- Self Help Group (SHG) Intervention for Women - The intervention empowers SHG women by increasing knowledge and awareness about Sexually Transmitted Infections (STIs) and HIV/AIDS; improves the women's negotiation skills to counter their vulnerability to STIs and HIV/AIDS; and enables the women to become peer educators. LEPRA Society worked directly with SHG women for two years. In year three LEPRA and APSACS, now provide technical assistance to mainstream the HIV/AIDS prevention activities into the Department of Rural Development's Indira Kranthi Padham (IKP) program to cascade the intervention in a phased manner to all SHG women in 23 districts throughout Andhra Pradesh.
- Mobile Voluntary Counseling and Testing (MVCT) - Vans visit 10 locations in East Godavari District to improve HIV/AIDS awareness and mobilize community utilization of free services offered by Harivillu, the VCT Van. Community members can visit Harivillu and receive HIV counseling and testing, treatment for STIs and Opportunistic Infections (OIs), and referrals to other services. All referrals are closely followed to ensure services are accessed and received.
- Follow-up Counseling - A Follow-up Counseling Toolkit was developed by CDC and IndiaCLEN to help counselors provide prevention services to HIV-positive clients. LEPRA Society is collaborating with APSACS and other partner NGOs to roll out follow-up counseling in the state of Andhra Pradesh. All counselors, whether they work in Integrated Counseling and Testing Centers (ICTC), VCT Centers, Antiretroviral Therapy (ART) Centers or elsewhere, will receive training to help People Living with HIV/AIDS (PLHAs) handle the situations that come in their life after diagnosed to be HIV positive, support PLHAs in improving their quality of life, and reinforce PLHAs adherence to treatment and behavior change through lifestyle and safer sex practices.
- Primary Health Center Enhancement Project (PHCEP) - LEPRA's sub-grantee, CHAI, and APSACS implement PHCEP in 10 districts of the state of Andhra Pradesh. The project goal is to provide accessible HIV/AIDS related services to the people of rural Andhra Pradesh through Nurse Practitioners (NPs). For the first time in India, NPs were trained and placed at PHCs to provide comprehensive HIV/AIDS care; including counseling, laboratory testing and outreach services. The NPs played a significant role enhancing HIV/AIDS services in AP and overcame the initial resistance by the medical community to their new roles.
- Quality control of HIV testing - LEPRA Society, through its sub-grantee IndiaCLEN, is providing technical assistance to NACO to set up National and State Level Quality Assurance Services (EQAS) Laboratories. The project supports strengthening laboratories and personnel of National reference Laboratories (NRLs) and State Reference Laboratories (SRLs).
Project Achievements and Innovations:
- SHG Intervention - From 2006-2007 a total 121,271 SHG women were reached in three districts of Andhra Pradesh through 670 village level trainers. There was an increase in HIV testing in those villages with SHG intervention. The trained SHG women reported their men also need similar kind of trainings since the men are the key decision makers in the family. The "Men's Intervention" was developed from the SHG Intervention. An abstract describing the SHG intervention was presented at the Global Health Conference 2007, Mexico. In 2008, the SHG Intervention had a formal mainstream launch to the Department of Rural Development's Indira Kranthi Padham (IKP) program. Three state-level Training of Trainers (ToTs) were completed for 110 IKP trainers. IKP will conduct 6 additional ToTs with LEPRA's support.
- MVCT - A total of 9,394 community members were counseled and tested (587 HIV positive). Mobile vans providing Information Education and Communication (IEC) covered 262 villages of East Godavari district. The District Collector of Hyderabad and APSACS invited LEPRA Society to provide technical assistance in rolling out government MVCT services throughout the State of Andhra Pradesh, for which LEPRA drafted operational guidelines for implementing MVCT.
- Follow up Counseling Training Program - State level ToTs were completed for 24 counselor trainers. An additional 47 peer counselors in the Telugu network of positives were trained.
- PHC Enhancement Project - Using trained NPs at PHCs enhanced the provision of comprehensive and quality HIV/AIDS services in remote rural areas of AP where regular health staff is not easily available. NPs are now accepted by PHC Staff and community resulting in enhanced and quality services in the PHC catchment areas. A total of 539,286 received Testing and Counseling services (26,230 HIV-positive); 234,255 received Antenatal Clinic (ANC) services (2,013 HIV-positive); and a total of 779 HIV-positive deliveries were performed. Task shifting to NPs is being considered for scale up in other districts and states by APSACS and NACO.
For Further Information: Lepra Society